Glaucous –winged gulls: 272
Chicks: 215
Sea lions: 370
Harbor seal: 50
Guillemots: 0
Oystercatchers: 4(3 adults +one young one)
Sandpipers: 45
Geese: 4
Cormorants: 0( but 6 seen yesterday and a fly of 20 in the week)
Elephant seals: 1 (1new young female)
Crane: 1
Weather: southwesterly wind 15 knots, calm sea, good visibility, atmospheric pressure :1024(HPA).Guy changed the membrane of the desalinator and now it’s working well. He changed the anemometer and speedometer. The gulls now are not so aggressive anymore and it was an easy job. He put on the electric fence around the main house and jetty. Catherine and Noemi cleaned the outside seawater sampling shed with brushes and a big flow of saltwater pumped directly from sea. A lot of fun! At the end of the afternoon we went and count the seashore birds, cormorants, oystercatchers and guillemots for the weekly animal census. We counted from the tower the gulls, sea lions and harbor seals.
On Race Rocks the fog rolled in the morning and afternoon so the girls had the opportunity to get used to the island cacophony: Horn, gulls and sea lions concert: “initiation” day! They found a dead harbor seal pup on the east side of the island and made a first estimation of the animals on the island from the top of the tower. At 6:00PM the fog was back and the horn honks almost the whole night.
Weather: 21 knots early rising 25 knots in the afternoon – Air temperature: 12 degrees Celsius -Water 12 degrees too. Barometric pressure: 1014 (HPA).
Birds: I saw a blue heron attacked by gulls so he left for the south Island and a fly of 20 cormorants. A big bloody chicken was under the diesel tank. This made a total of 9 dead found chickens.
Noemi and Catherine arrived for their 15 days of summer services. They came with Courtney and Chris. We went around and help them to settle in their new house. Courtney checked with Guy the desalinator and the testing they did showed that the membrane needed to be changed. After that they looked at the connections for the electrical fence and decided the spots needed protection from the sea lion’s invasion, especially around the 2 houses and the crane. The old ladder went ashore and will be replaced by a new stainless steel one.
They even spoke about some rain! It would have been a chance to get some rock cleaning done. I even didn’t think about the grass which was green long time ago, yellow a few days ago and brownish now with the lying sea lions. The generator and the desalinator were working in anticipation of the students: Noemi and Catherine who will be with us from tomorrow to the 27th .We did a check up in their house and cleaned the windows of the 2 houses. We found 2 more bodies of some very small chicks on the rocks: fight for territory between 2 gulls families I guess.
That’s it: we are invaded. Sea lions slowly crawled on the grass behind the crane and pretty soon they were all on the same crowded spot, side by side in rows. Amazing when you see that for the first time. Guy tried to fix a new wind wane and an anemometer but it was impossible the gulls were too aggressive. He had to submit. Maybe next week
It has been a quiet day, north wind in the morning becoming west later in the afternoon with a maximum of 30 knots. Visibility was 10 miles. Nothing to signal except a plane flying over in the morning and the visit of 10 geese gone the day after. We spotted 2 chicks with a broken leg. Guy put more water in the huge reserve underground
Exceptional weather those last days: no wind, flat sea, sun.
Young gulls get bigger than the adults maybe because of a fluffy undercoat. They are almost ready to fly for good and they even sometimes attack the adults. When we came back from Pearson College on the 10th we found a young goose dead on the side of the water-sampling house, almost inside the old tree boat. Now we have only four of them. First we couldn’t tell what was the story behind but after a closed look we discovered a very neat, clean hole in the neck. It was clear that the bird was not killed for food but had been attacked. It’s not sure but the gulls could have done it: a territorial conflict.
We saw in the distance going towards the open ocean a really huge barge charged with a 4 or 5 five floors building! Maybe it was for an oil platform somewhere in the coast. We never saw something big like this one before. Speaking about boats around Race Rocks we have counted around 20 Sea lions watchers each day. The Sea lions get slowly closer. They are so beautiful and some pretty big. We saw one with a flasher. A few ones have a green tag and one have a big number on its skin
Glaucous –winged gulls: 285
Chicks: 130 to 150
Californian Sea lions: 120
Northern Sea lions: 70
Harbour Seals: 50+young ones
Pelagic Cormorant: 3
Oystercatchers: 4
Pigeons-Guillemot: 60
Western Sandpipers: 60to70
Whimbrel: 1
Eagle: 1
Geese: 5
Elephant Seal:0 But Courtney from Second Nature saw 1 small one on middle island
West wind- 15 knots early- Forecast 25 on the afternoon – visibility 10 miles clear.At 5h30 Guy saw the family of 5 geese coming flying back from a trip somewhere.I was speaking about rough times between those gulls: we found out that one chick got a broken leg and I guess with small chance to survive. Finally we could go ashore and when we came back the elephant seal was not on the island. She left 2 days ago on the 5th so pretty sure she left too for good. End of the season for those nice companions!The seawater is getting colder under 12 degrees and the salinity around 32. Air is cool too especially in the morning between 14 and 15 degrees and less if it’s foggy